For four hours Friday night, China chose the story that it would tell the world.
After a half-year of torch-relay protests, Tibetan unrest, criticism of human rights, and concern about Beijing skies as opaque as custard, the Opening Ceremonies were a glimpse of China as it sees itself.
From the Olympic Stadium to thronged public squares equipped with big screens, it was one enormous exhalation – the moment when years of anticipation became a night of unconditional joy.
Chinese athletes giggled like schoolchildren as they entered the stadium, spectators stopped every few feet outside the Bird's Nest, snapping photo after photo of themselves in front of it, astonished at what their country had accomplished.
From the moment these Games were awarded to China seven years ago, the sports have always seemed likely to be eclipsed by the story. Determined to take its place among the world's great political and economic powers, China took these Games as a way to make a statement.
Even before the Games have begun, it is making that statement. Spending $43 billion will do that. Athens spent $12 billion, and workers were still painting on opening day. The level of preparation and efficiency evident in the Beijing Games is unprecedented and very possibly unrepeatable.
"I don't think there's a US city that could match this at this time," says Peter Ueberroth, head of the United States Olympic Committee.
But the Opening Ceremonies were about more than plaudits for architecture and organization. They were China's chance to write its own narrative. Appropriately enough, in a performance built upon the theme of traditional Chinese writing, the pen was at last in China's own hand.
China's martial beginnings, recalled in menacing drumbeats and guttural war cries, provided a suitable tableau for the sort of epic imagery that has become the staple of the country's increasingly confident view of itself. The opening half hour of the Opening Ceremonies was an unalloyed expression of the power of the collective organism – an artistic oriental Communism – with intricately choreographed movements of masses of people anonymously subsumed in the spectacular whole.
Drummers rattled in the pitch dark, their neon red sticks flashing in military time. Blocks of pale gray rose and fell in ever-shifting Escher patterns – the audience unsure if the motions were human or mechanical until, at the end, men emerged from beneath them like Jack-in-the-boxes.
As the ceremonies progressed, however, they took a more human face, coming to the world. Amid forests of sheer fabric on which shifting images of water and light skittered, Tai-chi dancers offered a glimpse of a peculiarly Chinese environmentalism – the unity of mankind and nature. No belching smokestacks here...
And like all great showmen, Beijing saved the best for last. In Olympic terms, it set the new gold-standard in torch-lighting ceremonies – former gymnast Li Ning circling the stadium while suspended more than a hundred feet above the stadium floor.
Bold. Innovative. Breathtaking. Precisely how the new China sees itself.
周五下午，中国选择用四个小时的时间向全世界讲述自己的历史。
近半年来，经过遭到抗议的火炬传递，西藏动乱，***批评，以及对北京天空透明度的关注之后，这场开幕式显示了中国对自己的看法。
从奥林匹克体育场到拥挤的公共广场，那里装备了巨大的屏幕——在这一刻，多年的期盼化作这一夜的无尽欢乐。
当中国运动员入场时，他们像孩子一样傻笑着，鸟巢附近每一个人都在那一刻驻足流连，一张一张的拍摄面前的一切，为他们的国家取得如此成就而惊讶。
从七年前中国获得奥运会主办权的那一刻起，体育似乎已经不是故事的主题。对于决心成为世界上最大的政治和经济力量的中国来说，这次奥运会是他们发表崛起宣言的一个途径。
甚至在奥运开始之前，宣言就已经发布了。这一切价值430亿美元。雅典花费了120亿，而他们的工人在开幕日还在忙着粉刷。北京奥运会这种水平的准备工作及其效率是空前的，并且很有可能是绝后的。
美国奥林匹克委员会主席Peter Ueberroth说:“此刻，我不认为有任何一座美国城市可以与这里媲美”。
但是，对开幕式的喝彩声明显超过了建筑和赛会组织方面的称赞。对于中国来说，这是一个表达自己的机会。这再合适不过了，书写一个表现传统中国的主题，而画笔最终落在中国人自己的手上。
战鼓和呐喊声揭开了中国式战争的序幕，一个史诗般的画面表现了这个国家对于自己越来越强烈的自信。开幕的半小时是一场纯粹的集体主义生物——一种东方共产主义艺术——的力量表达，编舞的动作设计错综复杂，参与的每一个人都融入壮观的整体之中。
鼓手们在黑暗中擂鼓，上下翻飞的鼓槌映出红光。许多灰白色的方块像埃舍尔（著名数学家，趣味画家）模型那样不断升起和落下——观众不能肯定这动作是由人力还是机械完成，最终，是人丛方块里像Jack-in-the-boxes一样跳出来。
然而，作为仪式的一个进步，他们向世界展示了许多人类的笑脸——就像中国自己一样。接下来转换到成水的影像和跳动的灯光，在轻薄织物的森林中，太极舞者表达了中国独特的环境观点——人类和环境的统一。这里没有吞云吐雾的大烟囱......
就像所有伟大的巨星那样，北京把最好的保留到最后。在奥林匹克名词中为火炬点燃仪式加入了最新的黄金标准——前体操运动员李宁在体育场上空盘旋，行走超过一百步以上。
勇敢，创新，惊人。这正是新中国对自己的看法。